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sole survivors inhabit the pool and
canals of Balmorhea. Is it a weakness
for a species that an entire irreplaceable
link in the ecosystem can be wiped out
forever? Or is it a strength, testified to
by their survival in this delicate strong-
hold of water in a dry land?
There are other species that cling to
the modern age with cold rare fins: the
Pecos gambusia and a pure genetic
strain of what the State Park calls “a
rare and declining” headwater catfish.
There are tiny crustaceans, turtles, and
aquatic snails depending on the man-
made canals of the little 50-acre state
park.
The San Solomon springs are the
largest in a long series of similar arte-
sian springs in the area. Beginning
some 400 miles to the north and west,
this enormous aquifer system channels
water through invisible limestone
cracks in the earth’s crust. Some arte-
sian spring water has been shown to be
over seven thousand years old—this is
the length of time it took each raindrop
to fall to earth and be absorbed, then
make its way through the secret twists
and turns, caverns and crevasses under
our feet, before being thrust, merrily
bubbling, into open air. When I touch
spring water, I like to imagine that the
last mammal it had contact with was a
mammoth, before disappearing under-
ground. It makes me feel tangibly con-
nected to an era whose distance behind
me I can’t quite wrap my head around.
People have used these springs for at
least 11,000 years. Hunters, thirsty
travelers, desert-weary nomads have all
tasted that water. The Apache routine-
ly watered there, and when white and
Hispanic settlers came to the area, the
boon of abundant water settled the
area quickly with farmers and ranchers.
The first canals were hand-dug, though
later, in 1927, the springs were dug out
and a larger canal system was created
by the state.
Before the springs were harnessed
for their power to support communi-
ties, they emptied into a cienega, a
large and rare desert wetland. Between
the dredging and the canal building
and, later, the CCC’s construction of
the pool and park, the cienega was
destroyed. Riparian ecosystems are
always the most delicate, perhaps
because they are so intricate, so diverse,
and so desperately needed for the sur-
vival of all the ecosystems around them.
The loss of the natural wetlands must
have been a staggering blow to the bio-
diversity of the region, much as I imag-
ine the loss of Comanche Springs to the
east must have been. But there were
great gains in the region from the
wealth of water that flowed from the
springs. Reaching peak productions of
20 million gallons per day, the springs
provided support for thousands of acres
of cotton, alfalfa, melons, cattle, and
many other crops vital to the economic
health of the area. Around that time,
the turn of the 20th century, there were
four men who got together to start an
irrigation company: E.D. Balcom,
H.R. Morrow, and Joe and John Rhea.
They lent the town and the future state
park their collective name: Balmorhea.
In 1934, five years after the begin-
ning of the Great Depression, the State
Parks Board acquired the springs and
about 50 acres around them. A year
later the CCC arrived and began con-
struction on the 1.75-acre pool and all
the buildings that grace the little park
today. In the 1990s the park built a new
cienega to replace the one that had
been destroyed by more than a century
of modern use. A second was construct-
ed a few years later. These manmade
wetlands are riotous with birdsong,
whistling reeds and aquatic life. Paths
and boardwalks allow visitors to
observe the desert oasis. Little trails
twist and turn through canebrakes,
meandering around and turning back
on themselves, making the tiny park
seem much larger than it really is. A
viewing deck overlooks the larger of the
two cienegas, but the overriding sense
of the wetlands is that they are there for
the plants and animals, much more
than for the visitors.
There’s something so fascinating
about the way thick grasses look under
a few feet of perfectly clear water. The
canals at Balmorhea are blue and
green, reflecting the sky and magnify-
ing the lushness of the wetland. The
water is crystal clear, like thick glass,
flowing inexorably away from the
source through manmade channels
toward Balmorhea Lake, where it is
used to irrigate thousands of acres of
farms and ranches. It emerges from the
spring and fills the pool at a tempera-
ture between 72 and 76 degrees, year-
round.
When I think of Balmorhea, I
always think of Comanche Springs.
Another artesian spring cluster, this
one in Fort Stockton, Comanche
Springs flowed at an estimated rate of
35 million gallons a day in 1899. A
pool, bathhouse and pavilion were con-
structed there too in the 1930s. But
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Cenizo
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